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NextGen Sales: Understanding Social Sellingby Barbara Giamanco - Jun, 2010There is fair amount of buzz about a concept called “social selling” (often used synonymously with Sales 2.0, a term coined and trademarked by Nigel Edelshain). Certainly some people will argue that sales, particularly B2B sales, has always depended on a sales reps ability to build a relationship with their potential buyer, which could be viewed as a social activity. Since successful selling has always revolved around relation...

Five Ways to Screw up Your Sales Leadsby Barbara Giamanco - May, 2010Companies invest sizable chunks of time and money implementing lead generation campaigns that are designed to deliver high potential sales opportunities to their sales force. The idea is that sales activity becomes more focused when reps are responding to qualified leads that have the highest potential for close (as identified by specific factors designed into the led gen campaign). In theory, this is exactly what should happe...

You Can’t Close the Sale if You Don’t Open Wellby Suzanne Bates - Feb, 2010“Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I’ll show you someone who has overcome adversity.” -Lou Holtz
The economy is still bumping along. This is a fact. Unemployment stubbornly sits at 10%. Businesses are holding back on their decisions. People are delaying their purchases. I flew back and forth to Florida this week and one third of the seats on both planes were empty. It all feels so - uncertain. The...

No Magic Bullet for Salesby Barbara Giamanco - Jan, 20102009 will be a year remembered for many things. Most of them non too positive. Financial meltdowns, rampant greed, thousands put out of work. Fear, negativity, anger and often complete disrespect for other human beings showed up everywhere. For entrepreneurs, it proved tough just trying to make it through, while at the same time companies beat them down on price and strung out the process of paying their bills to boot. Sales o...

How to Communicate Difficult Stories on Your Resumeby Barbara Safani - Dec, 2009My son just recently celebrated his birthday. It is a tradition in our family to tell our kids the story of the day they were born each year on their birthday. And while I’ve been telling my son this story for the past 13 years, it has always been somewhat sanitized. You see, my son’s birth was particularly hairy and what seemed like a routine delivery quickly turned into an emergency. For awhile, the doctors didn’t know if he...

The Shortest Distance Between YOU and $$$$? Network Calling!by Bernadette Boas - Dec, 2009Did you notice I did not say Cold Calling? I said Network Calling...more on that in a minute.
Like so many people, when I went out on my own, I knew that my marketing plan would include various techniques; definitely networking, one-one close contact lead generation, referrals, partner programs, direct mail (maybe), third party telemarketing (maybe). But one technique I was not prepared to do, nor did not want to do was the...

Beware of the Great Business Sabotager - the Holidays!by Bernadette Boas - Dec, 2009For a lot of businesses the holidays bring the last minute rush of sales before the year comes to a close.
For other businesses and their owners the holidays create distractions for them that the ringing of the cash register doesn’t seem to help.
Here are a few distractions (or what I call excuses) that I hear from clients, prospects, colleagues, and anyone else who is looking to postpone activities:
• “Businesses sto...

Storytellng for Sales Professionalsby Suzanne Bates - Dec, 2009If you want to be successful in sales you know what you need to do.
• Find out what the customer wants.
• Create a high value proposition for the customer.
• Give the customer what they want.
Step one is what trips up most sales people.
Why?
They never find out what they customer REALLY wants.
We are so focused on selling what we need to sell and making our numbers that we fail to do the things that will he...

Time for a Rebootby Barbara Giamanco - Nov, 2009A series of recent events has me thinking about how “stuck” people seem to be in their approaches to situations of all kinds. As human beings, I suppose its part of our hard wiring to resist change, even when presented with information suggesting we move in another direction would be wise. Reminds me of the movie – Groundhog Day. Bill Murray portrays Phil Connors an egotistical TV weatherman faced with living one day in his li...

Do You Want Fries With That Burger?by Barbara Giamanco - Sep, 2009A conversation earlier today reminds me of what I see as a pervasive, obsessive attitude in our society – a me first, quick fix, I’m so important, gotta have it now mentality. That attitude and short sighted thinking can never lead to building a sales pipeline that leads to closing business consistently month in and month out.
Look around the next time you are out in public and notice the couple sitting at a nice restaurant...

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